Could've Been
by Naisumi
Summary: It's been six years and Scott's married to Jean, the past presumably buried. However, is it true that past relationships that seemed so preordained at the time will stay locked away? (SLASH) [L/S, S/L, P/L, J/S, L/P eventual L/P/S] And...bad summary x.x


Title: Could've Been 

Parts: 1/? 

Author: Naisumi 

Rating: R 

Disclaimer: Not mine. Damn. 

Warnings: No spoiler; STNH (Season Two Never Happened), slash 

Pairings: Lance/Scott, Scott/Lance, Pietro/Lance, Lance/Pietro, Jean/Scott, eventual Lance/Scott/Pietro 

Notes: Whee...Angst. I have nothing to say because I'm really freaking tired and...yes. So...review. Please? 

Enjoy and C&C!! 

  
__

"Welcome to the real world", she said to me 

Condescendingly 

Take a seat 

Take your life 

Plot it out in black and white 

Well I never lived the dreams of the prom kings 

And the drama queens 

I'd like to think the best of me 

Is still hiding 

Up my sleeve   


They love to tell you 

Stay inside the lines 

But something's better 

On the other side 

I wanna run through the halls of my high school 

I wanna scream at the 

Top of my lungs 

I just found out there's no such thing as the real world 

Just a lie you've got to rise above 

**No Such Thing** ~ John Mayer 

-- 

He circled the room once, twice, then sat down heavily once more. Glancing out the window, he noticed it was already dusky. The disk-like clock flatly read twenty-eight minutes past eight with two vindictive needle-point arms. _He_ had been supposed to be here at six. 

'He's not going to come,' he remembered Pietro saying, 'you know he's not going to come.' 

'You don't know that,' he'd replied, 

'He just might.' 

'Lance,' the slender cerulean-eyed mutant had looked at him pointedly, 'he's a married man now. There's nothing for him here.' 

"He'll come," Lance now murmured to himself, "he has to. He has to keep his promise, too." 

Sitting at the smooth gray-patterned table, he drummed his fingers, eyes roving over the slanted blinds shielding the Pyrex windows, the business card-sized courtesy card propped up by the wall; half-full salt and pepper; ice-cold coffee mugs, the bitter brew inside untouched. The Doppler effect of a car zooming by caused him to turn his head slightly, tilting his chin to the side. 

The phone rang. 

"Hello?" 

"Don't sound so hopeful," Pietro said softly on the other side. There was the sound of paper rustling in the background, index cards being straightened against a desktop. 

"I'm assuming," the dove-haired youth breathed quietly, "that he hasn't shown yet?" 

"No," Lance replied vaguely, idly distracted by the neon pink glow of the sign outside on the slate-gray window shades, haloing the floor and tables and chairs like morning haze. 

"Not yet." 

He heard Pietro sigh. 

"Come home, Lance," the familiar voice was pleading, 

"Forget about him." 

"I can't," the amber-eyed man said almost desperately, 

"I lo--" 

"He doesn't deserve that!" Now Pietro sounded impatient; "He _left_ you!" 

Lance was silent and the willowy boy on the other end of the line was as well. Then, after a few more moments, Pietro mumbled, 

"I've got to go. Take care, Lance." 

And he hung up, the click of the phone frighteningly conclusive. 

The clock continued to tick a few times, then slowly, Lance let the receiver slip from the side of his head, the flesh of his palm, the numbed fingers of his hand, and let it clatter onto the countertop loudly, violently, too brashly. 

Settling back down in the lonely diner, Lance looked at the blinded windows, his cold coffee, the bright sign just outside, and waited. 

  


  


  


  


"He didn't come, did he?" Pietro slid the glass of bourbon into his friend's hands. Lance automatically took a sip, his eyes dull. 

"I told you he wouldn't," the azure-eyed boy pointed out quietly. 

"I know," Lance said after a while, 

"But I had to try." 

They didn't say anything after that, the younger sitting down and staring at the terry cloth-like cheap carpeting, the older drinking the burning alcohol occasionally, the smooth crystal cup cradled between his hands. 

Eleven o'clock. 

"Maybe he didn't get my message," Lance spoke up. 

Tick, tick, tick. 

Pietro didn't reply. 

  


  


  


  


"This is the diner," Jean pushed the car door open before primly taking a step out. 

"You want me to go in with you?" 

"No, that's alright," Scott was already at the entrance. 

"I won't be long." 

The glass of the door was cool against his hand and he pushed it open, the tinkling of a bell announcing his presence self-importantly. Once inside, he wasn't sure what to do; just simply peered about at the sunlit bars of light streaming through the windows, the mostly empty booths with artificial too-smooth leather seats and granite-patterned tables. 

"Hey," he addressed the waitress next to the cash register, who was wiping the countertop with a dishrag. 

"Do you, by any chance, know where Lance is?" 

"Lance," the teenaged girl repeated, quirking a pierced eyebrow. She snapped her gum and jutted one hip out as she tapped her ffoot on the tiled linoleum floor. 

"Alvers," Scott clarified, feeling daft for not stating his last name in the first place. 

"Lance Alvers--yeah, I know him," She absently inspected the back of her hand, the fake silver of her multitude of rings gleaming too-bright in the fluorescent lights overhead. 

"Where is he?" He was beginning to feel jittery. 

"In t'back, I guess." The waitress pointedly returned to her task, evidently bored with the conversation. Scott lingered by the gray counter for a few more moments, delaying the inevitable, then headed toward the rear of the diner, shouldering open the swinging door of plywood. As he entered the back area, he heard a voice ask loudly, 

"What do you want?" Scott paused, then turned to look at a boy who was leaning against the doorjamb of the back exit to outside. He exhaled a thin stream of smoke, ignoring the 'no smoking' sign, then sauntered back in, adjusting his plain grease-stained apron. 

"Do you know where--" Scott began, but was interrupted by the surly-looking teenager. 

"Alvers. Yeah, yeah, I know--'heard ya talkin' to Wendy up front." 

He flipped up the lid of a large metal cabinet and heaved up a cardboard box filled with soup crackers. 

"He's in his office right now," the boy said flippantly before heading out to the kitchen without a second glance back. 

"Office," Scott repeated to himself. 

_So he's got an office now?_

Wandering about the pseudo-warehouse, Scott finally found an oak door labeled 'co-ex' and a hastily scrawled makeshift placard that read 'Lance Alvers' on it in thick bold lines of sharpy and angular letters. The a's were slightly crooked. 

Just looking at the handwriting summoned forth an unrelenting torrent of memories--memories that he fought to both make sense of and to disregard. He shook his head, and took a step closer, pressing his palm to the warm wood of the door. He wondered if Lance hated him now. 

'Meet me at the diner at 6 p.m. Please. 

June 21st, corner of 45th and 42nd.' 

No, Lance didn't hate him, and that made him feel all the worse. 

Abruptly, the door opened from underneath his hand and he took an instinctive step back, reflexively jerking his arm to his side to hide his previous action. 

"Eric, what the hell are y--...oh." 

Lance sounded like he'd lost his breath, his dark eyes wide; lips slightly parted--collar undone and rumpled oxford shirt untucked. 

"Scott." 

Scott opened his mouth to speak, but found that he couldn't. Then, before he could, Lance ventured hesitantly, 

"I missed you." 

No, Lance didn't hate him at all. 

  


  


  
  


"I..." Scott wet his lips with a swipe of his tongue, shoving his trembling hands into the acquiescing pockets of his khakis. Slient, the dark-haired man stood to the side, beckoning him into his office. 

"It's, uh...kind of hot out today, isn't I?" 

Scott tried to grin in reply but failed and, instead, sat down gingerly at the edge of an odd-looking, but comfortable, armchair. 

"Y-yeah, it is." 

"Want some lemonade?" Lance was holding a ceramic pitcher, his thumb rubbing uncertain circles in the condensation beading on its smooth surface. Behind ruby lenses, Scott numbly followed the motion. 

"Uh, no, thanks. Jean's...Jean's waiting for me outside..." 

Circle, circle. Pause. 

"Are you sure?" 

"Yeah..." 

Circle, circle, circle." 

"...I'm sure." 

Lance poured himself a glass after a minute, the melting cubes of ice clinking hollowly together at the bottom. Sitting down across from Scott at the cluttered desk, he set down the glass--without a coaster, Scott noted--and bounced his foot up and down. 

"So, you wanted to talk?" Scott asked. 

Up, down, up down. 

"Yeah, uh..." Up, down, up, down. 

"Um, just...just wonderin' how you were. That's all." 

"We're fine." 

Up, down, up down. 

"How is everyone?" 

"They're good..." Up, down, up, down. 

"Jean's...she's good, too." Up, pause, down. 

"That's...That's good." 

Funny, Scott thought, I never knew Lance was such a nervous person. 

"How's Pietro?" 

"Goin' to college," Lance reached for his glass of lemonade, then stopped just short of it, flattened his palm against the desk, and drummed his fingers instead. 

"He's doing well." 

"That's good." Scott winced at how impersonal it all was. 

"Yeah," Lance nodded jerkily, "Yeah, it is." 

Silence. 

The radiator hummed faintly and a radio somewhere played vague strains of pop music. 

"I'd..." Scott started, then paused; cleared his throat, "I'd better get going." 

"You'd better," Lance echoed. 

"I...I'll see you around?" Scott managed, even though it came out as a question rather than the reassuring farewell he'd meant it to be. 

"See you later," Lance mumbled, staring at his desk with disconcerting dull eyes. 

"I...Bye." Fumbling with the doorknob, Scott stumbled out of his office, shoving the door close behind him with a little too much force so that it bounced in its frame. 

"Hey," the kid--apparently named Eric--called, still loitering around the back. 

"Yer lady was lookin' for ya." 

"I know," Scott said a little too quickly, a little too snappishly. 

Then, watching the man with movie star sunglasses and faltering footsteps walk away, the kid wondered outloud, "What the hell's gotten int'him?" 

  
  


  
  


"What took you so long?" Jean demanded. A frown crossed her countenance as she noticed the paleness of his complexion; the unsteadiness of his hand, fumbling with the ignition. 

"Scott?" She leaned over, both hands clasped at the crook of his arm as he sank into the driver's seat, 

"What'd he do?" 

"Nothing," Scott whispered, his lips feeling chapped. 

"Well," Jean settled back, looking somewhat mollified, "that's a good thing, isn't it?" 

'Yes,' he wanted to say, but couldn't bring himself to do so. He nodded, instead. It _was_ a good thing...wasn't it? But if it was...then why did he feel so disappointed? So empty? 

"Let's go home," Jean beamed up at him, and he nodded again, trying to twist his mind around himself but found that there was nothing there to begin with. 

  


  
  


  


"God, that went badly," Lance muttered, rubbing a hand over his haggard face. He tipped back the glass of lemonade, grimacing as it tasted slightly sour, too-cold and stinging to the dryness of his throat. He closed his eyes, leaning back and wishing he had a fan to alleviate the torpid heat of summer. He could hear the cook making deli sandwiches, the sound of cellophane wrapping sticky slick transversing the humid air as the radiator lulled. 

_God, I fucked up._

'How is everyone?' How stupid. Talking like that to Scott..._Scott_ of all people. 

_I sounded like a fucking pansy..._

The phone rang and he snatched it up immediately, exhaling sharply as Pietro's voice came through before he could even use a professional greeting. 

"Hey!" 

"Pietro," Lance managed, pinching the bridge of his nose. 

"I fucked up." 

"What?--Summers?" the ashen-haired boy sounded bewildered at first, before he said Scott's last name, sharply, anxiously. 

"What happened?" 

"He dropped by..." 

"What _happened_?" Pietro repeated, now impatiently. 

"_Nothing_," Lance spat with frustration evident in his voice, "God, he was _right here_, and all we talked about was--was _how everyone was_! What a mess--God, what a..." 

He drew in a convulsive breath and forced himself to calm down, unhooking his fingers from where they clutched the phone cord, tight. 

"Lance," Pietro sighed after a minute or so, the sound of their breathing the only noise there. 

"Hold on, I've got another call on line two," Lance mumbled wearily. 

"They can wait," Pietro said, but lapsed back into silence anyway. 

Lance picked up the call, answered, the other person politely, then switched back to the main line, finding silence. 

"Pietro?" 

There was a pause, then, breathlessly, 

"Yes?" 

"Pietro, what do I do?" 

More silence. 

"You move on, I guess," Pietro replied softly, 

"What else _is_ there to do?" 

  
  


  


  


He kicked off his shoes and tumbled into bed, eyes slipping close reflexively under the feverish flush of exhaustion. He could hear the answering machine beep loudly and Todd's voice came through, sounding slightly younger over the artificial connectedness of the phone. Lance tuned it out, drifting into a numbed uneasiness that was somewhat akin to a coma; glorified stasis sleep. 

The shadows on his wall spread outward from some origin in space, like a puddle of night, invading his room until there was nothing left except blackness and the glow of fire engine scarlet from the digital clock on his nightstand. He pressed his cheek to the cold crispness of his cotton-covered pillowcase and swathed himself in the star-abandoned silence, starving himself from all sound as he bled his ears dry--remembering conversations from long ago; remembering memories hungrily, then casting them away, trying to forget. 

'I love you.' 

'I know.' 

He squeezed his eyes tight, whispered the words out loud, 

"I love you." 

'I know.' 

  
  


  


  


Pietro stared down at the slip of tattered paper in his hand and hesitated before glancing back up and reading aloud, 

"316 Wexington Drive..." 

The gray of morning was stifling and so he slid down against the side railing, sitting on the hard cement of the front steps and wrapping his knees with his arms, as if trying to make himself as small, insignificant, as possible. There was the silence of dawn--only breathing, only mist, only the soft chirping of birds--and he was still. 

Waiting. Quiet anxiety. 

The sound of a door squeaking open greeted Pietro's ears and he stood instantly, lips pressed tightly together. 

"Scott Summers," he said aloud into the hushed silence and in response, there was hesitation in the languid footsteps. 

"P...ietro?" Scott seemed startled, his countenance flushing lighter as he approached the other man. 

"Why are you...?" 

"I have to talk to you," the ivory-haired boy murmured firmly. 

"Uh, well, you can--" 

"No, not inside," Pietro's eyes flickered to the front door, still ajar, his lip curling slightly with obvious disdain. 

"I don't ever want to see the inside of your house, Summers," he said, cerulean eyes dark. 

"Alright," Scott said quietly, still rather pale. 

"Know of a park?" Pietro asked with discouraging brevity. 

"I'll go change," the bespectacled man replied. 

  
  


  


  


"So what did you want to talk about?" Scott inquired, ducking his head slightly as he shouldered past a low-hanging bough of pine, the verdant leaves riffling with the motion and sounding like rainwater. 

"Don't ask me a stupid question like that," Pietro said, his long-fingered hands crammed into the pockets of his Levi jeans. He withdrew one briefly to roll the left sleeve of his shirt up toward his elbow, then changed his mind and pushed it back down to leave it on the cusp of his wrist, indecisive. 

"Don't you dare ask me a stupid question like that," he repeated, azure blue eyes blinking rapidly against a burst of summer heat and wind. 

Scott didn't reply at first, and when he did, his voice was awkward; his words faltering, stumbling over each other. 

"How is he?" 

"How do you think?" Pietro snapped, then paused, dragging his heel along the beaten dirt path. 

"I don't really blame you for leaving, Summers," the younger began again, softly, 

"I don't even blame you for getting married. But you have to give him some closure," he glanced up at Scott, and through scarlet panes of quartz, his eyes seemed dewy, framed with black--heavy eyelashes, too thickly fringed to appear pale albino blond. There was a quirk in his lips; a bitter, dry hint of a curve, as if he were living a snapshot moment of time whence upon he was trying to decide whether to smile or not. In him, Scott could see something familiar--something thriving hidden, riveting. He wondered if he was going mad. 

"I can't talk to him," the chestnut-haired man spoke quietly into the sunbeam-soaked silence. 

"I don't know how." 

"That's bullshit," Pietro scoffed, plucking a veined emerald leaf in passing and absently rolling it into a cylinder between his fingers. 

"Why wouldn't you be able to talk to him? You're in love with him, aren't you?" 

Scott, froze, his steps slowing, and he rasped back shakily, 

"I am not." 

"Of course you are," Pietro stared at the hiking trail before him, continuing almost nonchalantly, 

"You just won't admit it." 

"That's not it!" Scott retorted impulsively, before saying more hesitantly, uncertainly, 

"I...don't _want_ to be in love with him." 

Pietro was quiet, then murumured, 

"You're not the only one." 

And was gone. 

  


  
  


  


"Cup of decaf, please." Lance glanced up at the familiar voice and was met with Pietro's lazy grin. 

"Hey, there, kiddo," he reached across the counter, mussed up the willow boy's dove-soft hair, then grabbed a hunter green ceramic mug from under the tabletop. 

"Don't call me that," Pietro grumbled good-naturedly, "I'm not a kid." 

"Hell, I know," the dark-haired man grinned, sliding the now filled mug of coffee toward his friend. 

"What's up?" 

Pietro shrugged, "I've got time to kill--thirty minutes before I have to go back to class." 

"Thirty minutes, huh?" Lance idly wiped his hands on a towel, then stood, wringing it between his fingers. 

"Pushing it close, aren't you?" 

"Nah," Pietro grinned cheekily, "I can make it back in five." 

"As opposed to four hours," Lance replied dryly, though amiably. 

"You know it," was the bright, cocky response. Lance turned to look at Pietro, watching the pale boy inspect himself in the reflective steel borders of the glass-paned guard over the salad bar, attempting to smooth down his ruffled hair. 

"Lance, you fucked up my 'do," Pietro complained and the other chuckled, wiping one of the tables with vigorous circular motions. 

"So," he finished off his coffee in a moment, then slid into the booth next to the one Lance was cleaning up, chin perched aloft on his palm as if ruminating upon the secrets of the universe. 

"I talked to Summers." 

There was the sound of something shattering sharply on the tiled floor as Lance fumbled with a glass half full with water. 

He swore under his breath, then knelt with dustpan and brush in hand to sweep it up. For a while, there was just the sound of glass tinkling, scraped along by sturdy bristles and meeting their disposal in a plain paperbag brown plastic dustpan. 

"He still loves you," Pietro's eyes were downturned, shadow dark lashes bright black against the ivory luminescence of the thin flesh of his countenance. He sounded pained. 

"He couldn't," Lance replied quietly. 

"He got married. He left. He just...He just doesn't give a damn." 

"Those aren't good enough excuses," Pietro said angrily, 

"You were in _love_!--" 

"Yeah, but _obviously_ he didn't feel the same!" Lance snapped back, paused, then sighed heavily, sitting down across from Pietro, who was now staring at his tightly clasped hands. 

"I'm sorry, Pietro," he murmured after a minute, sounding subdued. 

"I didn't mean to yell." 

"I know," Pietro tipped back the mug, sipping at the last drops of coffee. 

"It's okay." 

Lance watched him for a moment, dark amber gaze catching the moonlit azure of his companion's, then leaned across the dining table, chin tilted slightly to the side as he carefully and lightly kissed him. The younger man tasted like French vanilla and the slight lingerings of fresh ground coffee, the heat of his mouth spreading damp as he met it with his own. For a brief moment, Pietro kissed back, but then he drew away, pale cheeks dusted rosy, dewy ocean blue eyes wide, breath ragged and spasmodic. 

"I'm sorry," he choked out, then disappeared, swept away by a gust of wind and his own footsteps pounding into the cement of the cracked sidewalks outside. Behind him, Lance rested his forehead against his quavering hand and closed his eyes, trying to ignore the saltiness on his lips and the incriminating dryness of his own eyes and face. 

  
  


  


  


Six years. 

Jean ran her fingers through her thick copper tresses, ten daintily picked up a hairbrush; drew it through her long locks of auburn and leaving them even more silky than before. 

She and Scott had been married for only two, but six years had passed since they left Bayville. Six years since Scott'd left _him_. 

It was true that she'd been the one to insist on it, but it wasn't as if they hadn't been heading in that direction at any rate. The whole mess had hardly been her fault; after all, what was the harm in saving them both the anguish of more pain? Anyways, Lance Alvers wouldn't have been able to give Scott what he wanted; Lance wouldn't have been able to give Scott what he deserved... 

Normalcy. 

Sure, false normalcy--partial normalcy, at best, but some semblance of ordinary would've been better than none at all. Being a mutant was bad enough, but also having a boyfriend instead of settling down safely with a wife and family? 

"Certainly not," Jean murmured to herself, rubbing cool jasmine lotion over her arms, the points of her elbows, the curves of her shoulders. Of course, she had to do what was best for Scott...do her best to help him achieve what he wanted, what he deserved out of life. 

There was the sound of a door opening and closing in the foyer, and Scott asking uncertainly, 

"Jean?" 

"Upstairs," she called, smiling to herself as her voice came out slightly husky. 

"Jean," Scott stopped short, brows drawing together, startled as he paused uncertainly in the doorway. 

"Wha--" 

She kissed him, scarlet lips pressed flush to his, pink tongue teasing its way into his mouth, her arms thrown about his shoulders, one hand playing with the shorter hairs at the nape of his neck. 

"I..." he began once they parted, looking flushed, bewildered, suffocated. It was warm and humid in the room; he could barely breathe--he could barely think. 

"Shh," Jean smiled up at him, slender fingers curling about the hemline of his shirt, sliding it up slowly, palm pressed to the warmth of his stomach. 

'Don't worry.' 

Scott's breath caught, the emerald brightness of Jean's eyes a shade so dark through his crimson gaze that they could've been burnt amber. 

'I love you, angel--I'd never hurt you.' 

She pushed him back against the comforter-strewn mattress of their queen-sized bed, soft torso moving against his as she spread her fingers wide on his chest. 

'I'd rather die than hurt you, you know?' 

Behind the static-filled white noise redness of his sight, Scott closed his eyes tightly, one hand reaching out for someone who wasn't there as foreign lips sucked lightly at his neck and shoulders. 

'I love you.' 

"I know," he whispered. 

  


  
  


  


"C'mon, c'mon, pick up," Lance muttered to himself, drumming his fingers on the side of the telephone booth. It had come as a complete surprise--this new crisis with Pietro, and he was now beating himself over the head with it. 

_Great going, Alvers--first you drive off Scott; now Pietro!_

He didn't even know what had caused him to try to kiss the younger man. After all, Pietro had always been a little brother--certainly not in the same respect as Todd--but still, he had been _family_. 

"What the fuck was I thinking?!" Lance hissed angrily, pounding his fist on the rickety glass wall of the booth. He sighed heavily, then hung up as he heard nothing but the dial-tone, resting his forehead in the palms of both hands. 

"I'm such an idiot..." 

"I'll say." 

Lance whirled around at the sound of the soft voice--mouth falling ajar automatically, 

"Pietro! Are you all right?!--I mean--that is--" 

He shoved the phone booth door open and stepped out, foot faltering slightly before meeting the ground, heel to toe. 

"--God, I'm sorry." 

Pietro watched him, wide soul-baring eyes of marble blue seeming strangely demure in the hazy unreal glow of the streetlamps all about them. 

"I don't understand you," the pale youth said finally, slender fingers fiddling nervously at the sleeves of his denim jacket. 

"Why?" 

Lance closed his eyes, drew in a deep breath, then expelled it. He fell against the side of the rectangular booth, head tilting back to meet the smooth glass that boxed it in like a jack o'lantern, lonely black telephone sitting inside under the glow of some unearthly-seeming light. 

"I'm so fucked up, Pietro," he whispered brokenly, lips barely moving in the staid hush of night. There was the sound of approaching footsteps before Pietro was next to him, honey sweet voice soft, 

"Look at me." 

Lance complied, burnished amber gaze reluctantly relinquishing their haven of darkness behind closed eyelids. 

Then, Pietro kissed him. 

It lingered--the silky softness of their lips together; the soft pause in breath; the hitch in heartbeat as silence was interrupted by itself, a different sort of quiet altogether. The kiss ended, and Pietro was looking at him again--gazing placidly at him with calm cerulean eyes. 

"You don't want me," Pietro quietly informed him. 

"You want _him_. Scott Summers." 

"I--" Lance began, wetted his lips, swallowed hard, then tried again, 

"I don't--" 

"Don't lie to yourself," the willowy man dropped his softly intense gaze to the crumbling cement of the sidewalk, the toe of one tennis shoe digging into one of the cracks that spiderwebbed it, fragmenting its surface. 

"You aren't a dishonest person, Lance, and it's not fair for you to _be_ dishonest to yourself." 

"Pietro," Lance reached out and tilted Pietro's chin back towards him as the younger started to turn away. 

"Pietro, let's talk. I'm...I'm all screwed up, 'tro--I don't know what the fuck I'm s'posed to do now." 

When Pietro still didn't respond, he chanced a step closer, 

"Please?" 

"Okay," Pietro sighed at last, lifting starlit azure eyes to meet his, 

"but only 'cause you asked so nicely." 

Lance grinned, and tentatively, Pietro smiled back. 

  
  


  


  


She propped herself up on her elbow, languidly brushing back a few errant strands of copper hair, and watched him, half-lidded eyes of jade sleepy. 

"Scott, where are you going?" 

The man in question walked back to the chest of drawers at the foot of the bed, shrugging on a polo shirt, then pulling it down, straightening it. He carded a hand through his hair and adjusted his shades out of nervous habit. 

"Just out." 

"Where to?" Jean leaned back against the ivory smooth pillows of satin, beaming up at the ceiling for no reason in particular. 

"I just want to get some fresh air," he wasn't looking at her. 

"Well, don't stay out too late," Jean said after a moment, frowning as she scrutinized his profile against the blank white wall. 

Halfway down the stairwell, Scott murmured quietly, 

"I won't." 

He stepped out the front door, his eyes watering despite his crimson spectacles as a blast of hot, arid wind caught him mid-stride, its humidity cloying like the scent of too much perfume--jasmine. It suffocated him and he drew in a breath, held it, then exhaling heavily as soon as it died down. He walked aimlessly for a while; watched the sky turn even darker; the stars even brighter, then he circled back to his own house; opened the car door of his corvette in the driveway and sat in the driver's seat. 

After a few minutes, no thought in his mind at all, Scott throttled the engine; listened to it rumble and purr quietly like a cat coiling its muscles, waiting to spring. 

"Scott?" Wafted through the open window of the bedroom on the second floor, upper right corner. 

He hesitated. 

'I love you.' 

Then, closing his eyes briefly, he pressed down the gas pedal; watched the moon-painted street approach him and vanish under his spinning tires as quickly as all other thoughts fled his mind. 

  


  


"I know." 

  


  


  


  


~tbc~ 


End file.
